Graze Mini Case Entrepreneurial Assessment Answer

GRAZE MINICASE

Question 1

Identify the unique nature of entrepreneurial management.

Answer:

Graze was found in 2007 by a serial entrepreneur Graham Bosher and deals in delivering healthy snacks by post. He started by focusing on three things - enormous size, customer needs, and existing players (Steier, Christian and Chua, 2004). The next thing Graze did was building a technology-enabled platform that helped to deliver the products very fast through the post. In 2009, the new managing director named Anthony Fletcher took the charge with new and innovative ideas. He tried the new range of snacking products and introduced real-time data that helped gauge customer preferences – good or bad, by analyzing their actual behaviors. To keep the quality and business up and running, in 2010, Graze procured most sophisticated equipment in order to carry out its own manufacturing. As a result, between 2010 and 2013, the revenues grew from 2.3 million pounds to 40 million pounds.

Question 2

Understand the strategic and organizational challenges involved in rapid and profitable growth.

Answer:

Strategic challenges: Before registering the figures of growth and profit, Graze had had its share of strategic challenges. Graze had to rely heavily on the shareholders who, in-turn put huge pressure to scale up operations by outsourcing. They also wanted Graze to become sales and marketing company and the very idea turned to be a disaster. The next challenge was to carry out huge R&D in deliverable lunch sector by spending a gigantic amount of money on non-preservative-based techniques. The successful R&D, however, posed a further challenge of carrying out transition without compromising its existing products.
Organizational challenges: Fletcher new the process of internalization was going to be very challenging and messy from his previous experiences. The fact that every market has its own dynamics, cost structures, and different consumer values made it difficult for Graze to enter international market smoothly. Besides, he was pretty concerned about new people, teams and organizational processes (Seifert and Petersen, 2002). He found it really challenging as to how to establish effective communication among them and how to control the autonomy. The next challenge that is staring in the face of Graze is how to replicate the UK growth story into US market. The dilemma is whether to invest in new lunch concept or to continue with the snacking concept. So, the challenge is to choose one, none or even both of them.

Question 3

Evaluate growth opportunities in a global landscape.

 Answer:

The fragmented market of Europe being different regarding eating habits made Fletcher not to be in any hurry, however, analyzing growth opportunities for Graze in the global market, Fletcher came across certain key attributes and criteria. Firstly high value is given to natural health and convenience to the customers. Secondly, the focus should be given to reminding them about snacking occasions. Thirdly, making sure that there is proper penetration of online shopping and credit cards. Fourthly, there should be reliable postal service and low-cost delivery of the products. Finally, the tax laws should be favorable, and pricing should be market-supported as well as understanding addressing market completion (Bekaert, Harvey and Siegel, 2007).

References

BEKAERT, G., HARVEY, C., LUNDBLAD, C. and SIEGEL, S. (2007). Global Growth Opportunities and Market Integration. The Journal of Finance, 62(3), pp.1081-1137.
Seifert, J. and Petersen, R. (2002). The Promise of All Things E? Expectations and Challenges of Emergent Electronic Government. Perspectives on Global Development and Technology, 1(2), pp.193-212.
Steier, L., Chrisman, J. and Chua, J. (2004). Entrepreneurial Management and Governance in Family Firms: An Introduction. Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, 28(4), pp.295-303.